


Delirium

by bigblueboxat221b



Series: Speaking in Tongues [7]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Science Experiments, Sherlock needs to label his stuff, Sick John, Sick Sherlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2017-01-12
Packaged: 2018-09-17 01:00:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9297284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bigblueboxat221b/pseuds/bigblueboxat221b
Summary: John and Sherlock are ill, and John accidentally double doses on cough medicine of Sherlock's own concoction. Fluff and a tiny bit of angst ensues.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Suicide Trigger Warning - discussion of previous plans to commit suicide. No actual suicide occurs.

It was like looking in the mirror, John decided, though they looked nothing like each other.

“We’re sick,” he croaked at Sherlock, who coughed in reply.

John tried to giggle, but it came out as a wheeze which descended into a coughing fit.

“Really,” Sherlock managed, pulling his heaviest dressing gown around him.

He was shivering, John saw, eyes bright, skin clammy and pale, the same symptoms John felt in himself.

“We need medicine and fluids and bed,” John insisted, watching Sherlock shuffled over to the couch, defiantly setting himself down, though it was more a drop and snuggle than his usual flop. John rolled his sore eyes, then went to the bathroom for some ibuprofen, pseudoephedrine and rehydration solution. He grabbed the duvet off Sherlock’s bed, too, resigned to spending the next day or three on the couch. It would be better if he could keep an eye on Sherlock anyway.

“Nope,” Sherlock said, flatly refusing the pseudo, though he grudgingly accepted the ibuprofen, washing it down with the sweet orange solution.

“Why not?” John asked, his voice still rough. He took a dose himself, then the ibuprofen, then settled himself at the other end of the couch, budging Sherlock up with his toes until there was more or less shared real estate.

“Makes my head funny,” Sherlock said.

John laughed, or tried to. “Funny?” he choked out, through his coughing.

Sherlock sighed. “I get soppy and sentimental as a drunk at Christmas,” he snapped.

John grinned. “Well this should be entertaining, then, because you’re going to drink this,” he said, measuring out a dose and handing it to Sherlock. He scowled, and John coaxed, “Come on, we’ll take it together, okay?” Sherlock made an, ‘oh, alright’ motion with his head, and John poured another dose, the two of them downing it together. As John replaced his cup on the table, he froze, looking at the bottle.

“Shit,” he muttered, sneaking a glance at Sherlock, who was trying to worm his way into a more comfortable position, entangling his legs with John’s in the middle of the couch.

“I’ve taken two doses,” John said in response to Sherlock’s raised eyebrow.

Sherlock smirked. “Looks like we both might get a bit sentimental, doctor,” Sherlock taunted.

“I’ll be fine,” John said, then looked at Sherlock suspiciously.

“What did you do to this?” John demanded, waving the bottle at him.

“Might have switched it for my own mixture,” Sherlock admitted.

John looked horrified. “Of what?” he asked.

Sherlock waved one hand airily. “A better medicine,” he said, “the only side-effect being that it makes the user quite…woozy.”

“Woozy?” John muttered darkly, realising he had no idea what he’d taken. He trusted Sherlock, but it didn’t sit well that he didn’t know what he’d just taken, or how it would effect him.

“We should try and rest,” John said, leaning back and closing his eyes, hoping that whatever else, the medicine Sherlock had doctored would work, easing their sinuses and helping them both rest.

+++

John must have dozed off, because he was startled awake by a fluttering sensation on his face. He wrinkled his nose, one hand brushing at his face. A high pitched giggle made him crack one eye open, and he was greeted by the sight of Sherlock dangling an enormous ostrich feather over his face, jaw set in concentration.

As soon as he realised John had seen him, he collapsed in a fit of giggles which trailed off into a coughing fit, though his grin never faltered.

John stared, his brain fuzzy and heavy, before he saw how hilarious this scene was, and he couldn’t hold back his own laughter. The sound that came out of his mouth seemed odd, high pitched, but everything was so funny, it didn’t matter.

“Tickles,” John managed, before dissolving into laughter again. It seemed to be forever, that he and Sherlock sat giggling before it subsided and they sat facing each other in the middle of the couch. John’s head felt heavy, so he leaned it forward and sideways, against the back of the couch towards Sherlock. Sherlock’s position mirrored his own, head almost touching John’s. John grinned at him, inexplicably happy to be here, floating on a cloud of good feelings, tucked up with his best friend, warm and dry.

“You’re brilliant, Sherlock,” John said soppily.

“I know,” Sherlock sighed contentedly.

“You’re rubbish at people, though,” John added in an equally soppy tone.

“Yeah,” Sherlock agreed in the same tone, and John giggled.

“I’m a lot better now, though,” Sherlock pointed out, and John giggled even harder.

“This is better?” he gasped.

Sherlock looked affronted for a second, though it was ruined by the giggle that escaped halfway through. “Definitely. You calm me down, Mister Doctor Watson,” Sherlock said, punctuating his name with pokes of his finger in the air towards John.

“Well bully for me,” John answered, sounding quite pleased with himself. “I don’t think you calm me down,” John said thoughtfully, “but it’s definitely better, having you around than not having you around.”

Sherlock was looking at him with wide eyes, like a child at Christmas. “What would you be doing if I wasn’t here?” Sherlock asked, his voice dramatically hushed as though they were in a pantomime.

It seemed perfectly reasonable to John. “I wouldn’t be here either!” he declared happily.

Sherlock frowned. “What do you mean?” he said, a lot more soberly than he had been in a while, a state that was totally missed on John, who was now singing tunelessly to himself.

“I was a depressed crippled soldier with a gun, Sherlock. I was going to –” he mimed putting a gun to his head and pulling the trigger, his head dropping dramatically to the side. He giggled at the mime, oblivious to the shaken look on Sherlock’s face.

For a long few moments, John giggled to himself while Sherlock sat and looked, his own head heavy, mind sluggish but sombre.

Finally John realised that Sherlock was not giggling. “What?” he asked, blinking as he tried to focus his eyes on Sherlock.

Sherlock didn’t speak, and after a moment he crawled under the duvet and out the other side so he was half sitting, half sprawled across John.

“Don’t leave me John,” Sherlock said, his voice muffled by the arm of the sofa in which his face was pressed. His arms were wrapped as much around John as he could manage, and John was flailing at the sudden contact.

“What? Sherlock I’m not going anywhere," John laughed, wrapping his own arms around the lanky detective.

Sherlock said something into the sofa, and John grabbed a handful of curls to lift his head, saying, “Repeat, please.”

“You saved me, you can’t go,” Sherlock said, his face turned away from John. His tone was adamant and a little mournful.

John wrapped his arms tighter around Sherlock, pulling the duvet around them again. He could feel the pull of the drug again, dragging him down into sleep, and he suspected Sherlock was headed the same way.

“Don’t worry,” John said, thinking of track marks in finger webbing and a service pistol in a desk drawer, “We saved each each other.”


End file.
